The use of a variety of shock absorbing devices for vehicles or the like is well known in the prior art. Typically, a suspension for land vehicles consists of a spring of some kind and a shock absorber that are mounted between suspended and non-suspended masses.
Commonly used springs include coil springs, leaf springs or torsion bars. These device consume a considerable amount of space in the vehicle and are also heavy and expensive.
Alternatively, air springs have been proposed to overcome the disadvantages noted above for mechanical springs. However, air springs are not without their disadvantages. These types of springs are also very expensive and space consuming due to their a very narrow band of spring rate values, vehicle height settings and usable suspension travels.
In view of the disadvantages noted above for both air springs and coil springs or the like, a need has developed to provide an improved spring for suspending a mass, particularly land vehicles.
In response to this need, the present invention provides a tunable air spring and shock absorber assembly which overcomes the deficiencies in the prior art. The inventive tunable air spring and shock absorber assembly is adaptable over a wide range of spring rates, preloads for setting vehicle heights and usable suspension travels.